This blog is dedicated to treating everyone - clients, prospects, friends, and family - as valuable partners. We should show them our gratitude through all our actions, including our marketing.

October 4, 2015

How & Why

All of us know how and why we are in our business. Maybe it
was chance, or maybe it was planned. Whatever the reasons, we must be able to
relate those stories to others in order to authenticate both ourselves and whatever
it is that we do. We must be able to explain our reasons in order to market our
legitimacy to others.

Marketing is a series of stories. We tell others stories
about our products or services and how they impact the lives of others. We relate
stories about how our business functions, how our employees treat customers, or
how customers use our products or services. We tell stories all day long, and
we must always be truthful in telling them.

Have we ever told anyone the stories of how and why we
started our business or joined the industry that we operate within? If we have
not, why haven’t we done so? We must be able to relate these stories in order
to authenticate ourselves to our prospects, customers, and clients. We must be
seen as valid in the eyes of those to whom we market, even if they are already
our customers.

Did we just wake up one day and become whatever we are? Of
course not, maybe a friend gave us information on a new industry or business.
Perhaps someone at a networking event passed us a referral to someone who might
be of interest. A recruiter may have called us to discuss a new opportunity or
career. We may have had an inspiration and started our own venture, or we may
have partnered with someone else.

Whatever the story, we all have one. How we arrived at the
current place in our lives is our how. We should demonstrate that a similar
process may apply to other people like it did to us. Maybe we are chatting with
a networking partner who is seeking to make a change, and our story may give
them the courage to strike out successfully.

In addition to our how story, we must be able to tell our
why story. Why do we do what we do, and why do we continue to do it the way we
do, even after the why is in our past. It might be the sense of accomplishment;
perhaps we are building a business for our family’s future. We could be following
a calling, or we might be in an industry which is a family tradition. Maybe our
business or industry is structured in our time and work; maybe it is unstructured
to the point of looking like play to others.

Telling these how and why stories does not have to take long,
just a few, short minutes together. We can summarize them into simple sentences
that someone may ask us to elaborate on, but they should be part of our
marketing. Our prospects need to hear our how and why in order to believe in us.
Our customers need to hear them in order to be more understanding about our
business and their great decision to partner with us.

What is our how and why? Can we tell the story that answers these
questions in simple and short sentences? Do we understand that we must be authentic
in our marketing and how these stories help present us as someone with whom
others want to partner and to remain partners? Our how and why is part of Gratitude
Marketing and our brand. Please leave me your comments, or email me
at Jim@JimTeasley.com, or call me at 360-314-8691.